never get involved in a land war in asia!

The advice given in 'The Princess Bride' apparently holds true in the game of Civilization as well; I got involved in an ultimately mostly-fruitless war against the Russians, even though I knew better, and I wasted a lot of time building up a war apparatus when I could have been pursuing cultural hegemony. Sigh. I think that 'wasted a lot of time' is the operative phrase in that sentence, since I could have gone to bed hours ago if I hadn't gotten sucked into the game.

Work today was fun; since it's so hot, there are occasional brownouts, even in Hitec City. It doesn't really affect work, since the computers stay on via the emergency generator; but I had a meeting with my manager today, and the power went off at least three times in half an hour. It's quite exciting, and breaks up the monotony of a normal day in corporate 'america'.

For dinner, Ranjit made 'Mexican' food; it's pretty close to Mexican, but it's not quite there, since there was no cheese, no sour cream, no refried beans, etc. However, the chicken fajitas were great, as were the burritos--I think he's cooking more of a weak Tex-Mex than a real Mexican cuisine, and I don't know where he's getting the recipes, but since I'd only had a peanut butter sandwich for lunch, I still managed to do his dinner justice.

I find that I'm getting more acclimated to having servants; I've come to accept the futility of convincing them that I can get my own water or that they don't need to stand up every time I enter the room, and so I'm not quite as uncomfortable as I was before. However, I'm still uncomfortable with the idea on a more abstract level...it makes me feel like an imperialist, like I should be getting paid by the East India Company instead of my actual place of work. I will definitely have to return with silks and spices, or else all of the guilt I feel over being essentially a high-tech colonizer will be for nothing.